Shadow in the North

Epilogue

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Isabel watched as the station attendants crowded around the elderly lady who had taken a fall upon the platform. She felt a pang of guilt at leaving the poor woman in the care of paramedics – and when daughter was as far away as Reading. And a fractured hip! Oh, it would be a nasty business, and for an elderly woman, no small injury. Her compassionate heart swelled with sympathy, and she felt herself quite useless – quite worthless – just to leave the woman to her lot. And yet, Isabel could not stomach a hospital; the smells, sounds and sights, too painful to her vulnerable heart, and so she only stood back, ascertaining that the lady was well looked after, and then returned to her bench to await the Oxford train. But there, once she took up her bag, she found that her precious metal box was missing. Frantic at the thought of losing the treasured contents of her box, she ran immediately to the information desk and described the tin and where it had been moved from.

'Munitions, you say?' replied a middle-aged man, with suspicious eyes. He looked at her intently, his jaw seemingly chewing on something unidentifiable. 'Try lost property. If it was a munitions box, someone may have thought it a suspicious package and taken it there. I'd give that a try.' Frustrated at being sent across the far side of the large train terminal, Isabel could only nod, fling her bag over her shoulder and hurry through the crowded platform, in the hope that she was reunited with her box, and did not miss the Oxford train.

Finding the station ill sign-posted, Isabel was forced to spend some fifteen minutes wandering about the platforms, before she found what she was looking for, and pushed through a small door into what she thought to be lost property or left-luggage. The room – which was little more than a cupboard of sorts – appeared to be deserted, and she called out for assistance upon finding no staff member within.

'Excuse me?' called she, her voice raised, but no reply came. She glanced about her; black bags on wheels, brightly-coloured tickets bound to the handles of the luggage, denoting recent overseas travel. So too, she spied a sportsman's racket and what looked to be a folding velocipede, but she could not see her brown munitions tin. 'Excuse me? Is anyone there?' called Isabel, her voice rising impatiently; her heart beating thickly, at the prospect of losing that most precious tin. There came the scrape of heavy boots upon the hard floor, and a man in white shirt and blue waistcoat appeared from about a doorway in the corner of the tiny room.

'Yes, madam? How might I help you?' asked the man; his voice melodic, giving the impression that his words were – to him – a song, sung many times a day.

'I had a battered brown munitions tin, which I left unattended for a few moments, and when I turned back, it was gone. Has it been handed in?' asked Isabel, anxiously. The man looked at her with a quizzical frown, his eyes boring into hers, as one pale brow was arched in suspicion.

'Munitions? I'll have to notify transport police if a box of bullets has gone missing from a busy platform.'

'No!' rushed she, holding up her palms in supplication. 'It is full of photographs and personal items. No ammunition of any kind.' The man only shrugged, looking a little disappointed that there would be no drama to ensue, before saying, quite carelessly –

'Nothing has been handed in, I'm afraid. Perhaps try the local police station – someone might have thought it suspicious, if it was a munitions box. Other than that, I can only suggest it has been stolen. There are thieves about; never wise to leave your personal things unattended.' Now he gave her a chastising look, and spoke to Isabel in such a way, as to make her feel the scolded child. Her temper rising – fraught at the prospect of her tin having been stolen, never to be returned to her – Isabel only scowled at the man, indignantly.